


The Other Side

by Selkit



Category: Dragon Age - All Media Types
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-09-19
Updated: 2014-09-19
Packaged: 2018-02-18 00:37:58
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,180
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2328845
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Selkit/pseuds/Selkit
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A young city elf ventures outside the alienage in search of a birthday gift for her mother, and finds more than she expected.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Other Side

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the 2014 Dragon Age Reverse Big Bang, inspired by Elvhenan, a fanmix by covenmouse.

Renna was still almost a mile from the alienage when the footsteps reached her ears. 

She slowed her pace, clutching the precious brown-wrapped parcel to her chest as though to muffle the thunderclap of her heart. Her ears strained over the sudden roar of blood pounding through her head, listening for the adjustment, the tell-tale sign that the footsteps were following _her_ and not simply disappearing down one of the city’s countless alleys. 

A pause, and then the dull thudding resumed, its rhythm slowed to match her own.

Fear shot through her like a crossbow bolt, and the world swam at the corners of her eyes, like the time Uncle had let her drink some of his ale when Ma wasn’t looking. She skittered forward, the fear buoying her, propelling her ahead too fast, and she forced her feet to walk instead of flee. 

_“Never run,”_ Pa had told her long ago. She’d been barely old enough to reach his waist, a tiny angular thing with elbows and knees jutting out from a too-scrawny frame, dusty cracker crumbs dotting her mouth like freckles, her braids as black and unruly as spilled ink. _“Never run from the humans. If you do, they’ll chase you every time. They have to. It’s in their blood. To their minds, they are predators, and we’re nothing but their prey.”_

Three years later he was dead, just another casualty of just another fever that gorged itself behind the alienage walls, but she remembered his words all the same. It was one of the few things about him she recalled with perfect clarity. 

Her feet felt like bricks attached to quivering sapling branches, but she forced them forward all the same, the streets scraping at her soles through the shabby leather of her Ma’s old boots. She risked a glance behind her, arms tightening around her parcel as the pursuers’ footsteps quickened again. She could see them now, weaving around vegetable carts and dodging other pedestrians in a casual twisted dance. Three of them, that she could make out—all humans, of course, two men and a woman. None of them were full-grown, but all were still older and bigger than her. 

_Don’t run, Renna._ Her teeth chattered as the words hissed through her mind. _Don’t run. Don’t run._

A quarter mile passed, and the footsteps pounded closer. Sweat began to trickle down her neck and between her shoulderblades, and instinct threatened to override her mantra. She gave in, breaking into an awkward shuffling trot, the parcel tucked beneath one arm throwing her off balance. 

_Don’t run_ gave way to _please help me_ , the desperate words somewhere between a plea and a prayer—though where they were aimed, she didn’t know. Her Pa would have told her to listen to the Chantry sisters who preached on the street corners with their ringing voices, wearing their saffron robes as bright as their beatific smiles. “Call upon the Maker in your time of need,” she could imagine them saying, “and one day you will be delivered to his side.”

But her Pa was dead, and the Chantry sisters’ beaming smiles slipped whenever she walked too close to them, and she had no intention of going to any god’s side for a very long time. Especially not the human god.

“Where are you off to in such a hurry, elf?” one of her pursuers called in a mocking rasp. The voice dogged at her heels, closer even than the footsteps. “This doesn’t have to be hard, now. Just give us the package and no one gets hurt. You’ll be free to slink back to your slums in peace.”

She felt herself spinning around, weightless, before she even registered the steel-tipped grasp on her arm. The parcel jolted against her side, sending a flare of pain arcing across her ribs. Her face twisted in a wince, and she grit her teeth, staring up into the human’s face and trying not to feel her heartbeat climbing up her throat, threatening to choke her.

“There’s nothing valuable in the package,” she said, pulling herself upright as best she could. “It’s just a birthday gift for my Ma, nothing more.”

“Well, I guess we’ll be the judge of that, won’t we?” The human yanked at her arm, throwing her off balance, and clawed at the package with his other hand. His two comrades moved up to flank him, looming like faceless shade demons. “Give it here, knife-ears.”

“Don’t call me that!” Her voice bounced off the cobblestone street, shrill with fear merging into anger. She planted her heels on the ground and jerked back with all the strength in her wiry shoulders, wrenching her arm free from the human’s grasp and stumbling backward, unsteady as a passenger disembarking after a long sea voyage.

She stood still just long enough to register the expression of blank astonishment on the humans’ faces before she skidded around, envisioning the alienage gate coming into view like a sanctuary. Her Pa’s solemn words fled her mind, and she gulped in air, setting down the road at a dead sprint.

Dimly, she heard the angry shouts and the thundering footsteps, the cat-and-mouse game long forgotten. They were dragons now, and she was nothing more than a pitiful lamb separated from the herd, all but begging to be devoured in a scorching wall of flame. 

_Please help me please help me please—_

Bright light flashed at the corners of her eyes, searing heat billowing behind her in a fiery blast that knocked her off her feet. She pitched forward, landing hard on her shoulder and careening to a stop in a heap of tangled limbs, staring up in a daze. Smoke prickled at the back of her throat, and she coughed, swiping at her watery eyes and squinting down the street.

All three of her pursuers were gone, leaving nothing but ash in their wake, the little white puffs drifting gently on the breeze like snowflakes.

Renna swallowed, scanning the sky with a bewildered gaze. _Did a dragon just swoop out of nowhere and…?_

But there was no shadow darkening the sky, no ominous drumbeat of dragon wings. Down the road, townsfolk murmured and grouped together in wary clusters, nudging each other and pointing. 

_Pointing at what—?_ Her head felt thick, her tongue fuzzy. She coughed again, pushing herself up to her knees, one hand darting out to search for the parcel. It bumped against her fingers, and she pulled it close to her side.

A shadow slanted across her, and she skittered back involuntarily, her gangly legs tangling beneath her and knocking her off balance again. She looked up, and the sun caught her eyes, sending a jolt of pain through her temples and severing the last fraying threads of her temper. 

“It’s nothing special!” she yelled. “It’s just a stupid birthday present. Stop trying to rob me!”

“A fitting way to thank your rescuer,” said a tart voice. “I’m not going to take your precious package. Get up.”

Renna blinked, craning her head around until the sun was out of her eyes. An elf woman stood in front of her, arms crossed, head tilted at a skeptical angle, an unimpressed expression plastered on her face. She wore a uniform that looked human-made, a rich deep blue patterned with silver studs that caught the sunlight when she moved. Renna had never seen an elf wearing such fine robes, free of ripped hemlines and patched-up holes. 

But most striking of all were the delicate tattoos etched on her skin, pale lavender lines scrolling across her chin and forehead and down the bridge of her nose. Renna felt her mind go blank with astonishment, her scattered thoughts erased like a candle snuffed out. She had never seen such markings before, but she knew them all the same.

_A Dalish elf, here in the city? And wearing human clothes?_

“What are you…” she began, then cleared her throat, gingerly pushing herself upright. Her knees and elbows sported impressive scrapes, and her neck and shoulders felt stiff and sore, but at least nothing was broken. “I thought it was a dragon,” she said, half-confused, half-sheepish. “There was fire coming out of nowhere—that was you? How did you—?”

Her eyes darted from side to side, landing on the mage staff strapped to the other elf’s back. 

“Oh,” she breathed. Sudden dread clawed at her stomach, tightening her chest. “Did you—did you kill them?”

“Sadly, no.” The Dalish snorted, derision dripping from her tone. “They turned tail and fled down an alley like frightened children. Cowards.”

“But—you still attacked them.” Renna’s mind churned. “Don’t you see? They’ll be coming after you, the guards and the templars and— _everyone._ For an elf to attack a human in broad daylight—” Her head spun, and she backed up a step, hands twisting in the tatters of her apron.

But the other elf looked completely unperturbed.

“I’d like to see them try,” she said. “Get a grip on yourself, girl! No one is coming after me. I’m a Grey Warden.” She shook her head, planting her hands on her hips and scowling. “Look at you, so quick to jump at every little shadow.”

“A Grey Warden?” Renna echoed, eyes widening. Even behind the alienage’s rickety walls, she had heard the tales of the heroic Wardens that had saved the country—elves and all—from the ravages of the Blight. “But I thought the Wardens were all humans?”

“Most, but not all.” The mage’s lip curled a little, and she sighed. “Enough of this. You’re unharmed, and I have important business to attend to, otherwise I wouldn’t even be in this wretched _shemlen_ city.”

She turned on her heel, the motion as brisk and no-nonsense as her voice. 

“Wait!” Renna scrambled forward, her mind still whirling. “You rescued me from muggers and you’re just going to leave? Don’t you want a reward or payment of some kind? I—my family doesn’t have much, but I’m sure we could come up with something to give you.”

The Dalish looked back over her shoulder. Her eyes were sharp, piercing through the loose blond locks falling across her face, but when she spoke her voice was almost weary.

“I have no need of your money,” she said. “Go home and give your mother her birthday gift.”

Renna took a deep breath, pulling together what remained of her courage. “Would you at least walk with me the rest of the way to the alienage?” she blurted out, then cleared her throat, taken aback at her own audacity. “I don’t mean to be pushy,” she added. “It’s just—I’ve never met a Dalish before. Or a Grey Warden. Or even a mage not being dragged away by templars.”

The Dalish narrowed her eyes, tattoos marred by the crease in her forehead. “I’m not some circus exhibition for you to gawk at,” she said, her voice dry and peppered with bitterness. “Besides, haven’t your parents told you all about my people? That we’re bandits and thieves and heathens?”

“Well…” Renna swallowed. “Yes? But you don’t seem like that. You could have swooped in and robbed me blind just now, but you didn’t. I’m just really curious. About everything.” She ducked her head, her smile turning rueful. “My Ma says it’ll get me killed someday.”

“You assume I came to your aid because I was being charitable,” the Dalish said. “How do you know I wasn’t simply seizing the opportunity to throw fireballs at humans?” But her lips twisted up in a smirk, and she made a sound that was half growl, half sigh. “Very well. Ask me your questions, if it’s so important to you.”

“Oh, really? Thank you!” Renna licked her lips, suddenly unsure of where to begin. She turned down the road in the direction of the alienage, keeping her steps as slow as she could without being accused of stalling. “What is it like to be Dalish? Do you really roam around in the woods killing humans all the time?”

To her surprise, the other elf laughed. Renna couldn’t quite decipher if it was an amused sound or a derisive one. 

“Not as often as you city elves apparently think,” the Dalish said. “Certainly I—we—weren’t opposed to killing them in order to defend ourselves, or if they otherwise deserved it. And they usually do.” Her face darkened a moment before it cleared. “But that’s not the primary aim of being Dalish, believe it or not.”

“Then what is?” Renna asked. “I always thought you lived outside the cities, apart from—apart from the rest of us because you hate the humans so much.”

“Dalish opinions on humanity vary more than you might think,” the mage said. Her eyes went distant, and Renna clamped her mouth shut, slamming the door on her next question. She knew that look well. It was the same expression that crossed her Ma’s face whenever she thought of Pa, and it meant _interrupt at your own peril._

“But anyway,” the Dalish went on, shaking off her memories like dirt from a garment. “The goal of the Dalish—the reason we _live apart_ , as you put it—is because if we did not, all of the culture and history of Elvhenan would be lost forever.” 

She turned toward Renna, her eyes sharp and calculating, and Renna suddenly felt very small. 

“Tell me,” the Dalish said, “how much do you know of elven history? Or language, or religion? How many of the gods in the pantheon can you name?”

Renna stared up at her, eyes wide. “There are elf gods?”

“You see?” The Dalish sighed. “You know nothing of your own heritage.”

Renna bit her lip and let her gaze drift to the side of the road, where the food vendors’ carts sat in haphazard rows. The scents of meat pies and roasted vegetables wafted through the air, normally enough to set her stomach to growling, but today her hunger seemed distant. 

“Is that why you hate us?” she asked, voice subdued, nearly hidden beneath the inviting calls from the peddlers. 

The Dalish grunted.

“We don’t _hate_ you,” she said. Her tone was almost grudging. “We simply don’t understand why anyone would choose to live like this.” She jerked her thumb over her shoulder. “Those humans who tried to mug you, for example. What would you have done if I hadn’t been here? In the clan, we have hunters whose spears and arrows make petty burglars like those think twice about harassing us.”

“Why are _you_ here, then?” The words tumbled out before Renna could think better of them. “My Ma says the Dalish almost never leave their own kind unless they have to, or unless they betray their clan somehow. Did you leave to become a Grey Warden?”

The Dalish didn’t respond, and Renna chanced a step closer, peering up at the older elf. Her face had gone hard and pinched, cheekbones jutting out like knives, and her eyes were distant again. 

“My reasons for joining the Wardens are not open for discussion,” she said, voice taut as a wire. “But…the answer is no. I was no longer with my clan when I became a Warden.”

“But why?” Renna pivoted to face the other elf, walking backwards down the street. “If being a Dalish is so wonderful, why would you leave it?”

“Nosy child!” The other elf groaned, grinding the heel of her hand against her eyes. “I haven’t magically ceased to be Dalish. I’ll _never_ stop being Dalish, whether I’m among the clan or not. I parted ways with them over a disagreement between myself and the Keeper. More than that, you don’t need to know.”

“But…I don’t understand. Weren’t they your family?” Renna frowned, thinking of the tiny thatch-roofed hut she shared with her Ma and Uncle. It was frigid in the winter and boiling in the summer, and the floorboards creaked, and the cupboards held little other than salt chews and dried fruits and crusty old bread hard enough to hurt her teeth. There were no trusty weapons or elaborate artworks, or any of the other grand things the Dalish surely must have had, yet she couldn’t envision anything that would make her abandon it—or the people that lived in and around it. 

“Don’t you miss them?” she asked. “How could you just leave them?”

She held her breath and fixed her anxious gaze on the other elf, half expecting to be incinerated on the spot. Instead, the Dalish slowed her pace, her brisk steps faltering. For the first time, her face softened, the pinched expression giving way to melancholy instead of anger. 

“Don’t think I haven’t asked myself that same question over the years,” she said, her voice a mutter that faded into a sigh. “Many times.”

She huffed out a breath, short and sharp like a dagger being unsheathed, and the pensive moment disappeared. “But what’s done is done,” she said. “Wallowing in the past serves no purpose.”

Her eyes lifted, and she jerked her head to the north. “There. That’s your alienage, isn’t it?”

Renna turned, mouth curving down in dismay at the sight of the alienage gates looming before her, as though ready to stamp out the questions still swarming in her head. She imagined her Ma’s fondly exasperated expression as the infernal curiosity bubbled up again.

“What’s a Keeper?” she asked. “Do you speak the old elf language? Can you say something in it? My Ma says that sometimes Dalish leave their clans because they have forbidden human lovers—is that what happened to you? Can you tell me about the Dalish gods?”

The other elf stared down at her, scowl returning at the sudden onslaught of questions. 

“Creators,” she muttered, shaking her head in resignation. Renna watched as she reached down to the small pack at her side, drawing out a leather-bound volume with obvious care. She flipped it open, fingers moving through the pages with practiced ease, and pulled out a small sheaf of loose sheets covered with small, neat writing. 

“Here,” she said, and pressed them into Renna’s hand. “Stories of the elves, the Creators, and elf heroes both old and new. Tales like these are all we have left of Elvhenan. Read them.”

“Oh,” Renna breathed, letting her fingers skim over the delicate vellum. “But don’t they belong in your book?”

“They belong to the People,” the other elf said. “I can write them down again. I still have a few blank pages left to fill.”

Renna blinked. “You know all these by heart?”

For the first time, the Dalish elf smiled. “Every word.” 

She carefully pressed the book closed, cradling it in her hands a moment before slipping it back into her bag. Then she turned, shoulders back, spine straight, and disappeared into the crowd. 

Renna watched until the blue and silver uniform was swallowed up in the city’s dingy browns and greys. She looked down at the pages and grinned, tucking them against her chest and turning toward home.


End file.
